76 parts finish?

[Larry Gawron]

What is the correct finish on the following parts: A-ARM SHAFTS, TIE ROD TUBES, HOOD HINGES, FRONT SWAY BAR.

The judging manual says the sway bar is natural. I'm the original owner and believe the sway bar was black. It also has some type of hard, thick, plastic-like coating on it that is flaking off?

The manual also says the hood hinges are a dull silver, but doesn't say if they are anodized, etc.

[Joe L.]

Re: 76 parts finish?

The tie-rod tubes and the a-arm shafts were natural, unpainted finish. If yours are original, they should be very rusty by now. The hood hinges are a dull, cadmium or zinc plate. They are not anodized. The sway bar may be either bare, 'as forged' or dip painted semi-gloss black. Most of the bars I have seen are 'as forged'. Based upon your description, I'd guess that yours are 'as forged'. This often appears as a blackened finish with a "flaking" surface; the hard, black flakes you see are actually the steel, itself. As far as I know, no stabilizer bars were ever 'plastic coated'.

[Jack H.]

Re: 76 parts finish?

Front sway bars on mid-year cars were 'mitted' on the final line. Guy used something like a wash mit, dipped in bucket of asphalt based frame paint, and whiped a quick & dirty irregular thin coat over the sway bar and some of the steering components. Don't think we've a lot of research on this for Shark cars.

It's interesting to look at the Noland Adams Vol II book. In each section of Sting Ray model year, Noland shows a GM photo of the undercarriage with the car held upright. Doesn't say where these came from or who took the shots for what purpose (Milford, before/after?).

If you take a magnifying glass and examine the front sway bar, you can see the 'mitting' process. 'Blobs' of paint drips show clearly. I asked permission at Bloomington once to inspect a '65 BB Benchmark car (Gold Certified + Survivor Certified = Benchmark, kind of like an NCRS Mark of Excellence + 4-Star Bowtie).

Sure enough, drips up to 1/4 inch appeared here/there. Plus, since the mit paint was water soluable asphalt based, the thinner areas of coverage appeared 'chipped' away. And, there were obviously places where there was no (missed) coverage.

Since sway bar isn't really functionally preserved by the painting, I can only surmize it was done for a marketing purpose -- black out the leading/trailing undercarriage components to keep the human eye from wandering away from the car's body lines/image.